Starfest brought the cosmos to Paxton

Last Saturday night, at Anna Maria College in Paxton, the Aldrich Astronomical Society proudly displayed various high-tech telescopes aimed at the sun, moon and stars during their Starfest celebration. Visitors were invited to look at the cosmos as Mother Nature cooperated by providing a perfect evening to view the solar system. This has become an annual event at Anna Maria.

This year the society commemorates the International Year of Astronomy as well as the 40th anniversary of the Apollo moon landing on July 20, 1969.

The Aldrich Astronomical Society is starting an Adopt a Library Program in Central Massachusetts to get introductory Astronomy and space-science books into local libraries. Members hope to spark enthusiasm about the mysteries of the day and night sky. They recently ran a program for the Richards Memorial Library in Paxton called "Make a Comet."

Looking at the sun through one of the telescopes revealed a huge red ball with a slight "feather" at the bottom. Jim Zebrowski, President of the Aldrich Astronomical Society, explained that this tiny feather was about the size of our own planet earth making us just a tiny speck in the solar system.

The schedule of events for the evening provided something for everyone. Presentations were scheduled every 45 minutes. The subjects included meteorites, gyroscopes, wandering on Mars, a Simulation Program that described the next generation of vehicles NASA is building to return to the moon by 2020, and the Kepler Mission to search for habitable worlds.

Dr. Donald W Rethke, a.k.a. Dr. Flush, gave two presentations. Rethke is a retired principal engineer for Sunstrand Space Systems International, and he stole the show. He is well known for being part of the team that designed, and keeps in operation the toilet facilities aboard the space shuttle — not an easy task in a weightless environment.

Rethke explained that he grew up on a farm in Wisconsin without indoor plumbing. He displayed the various plumbing features of the original space program as well as new developments as they progressed. There is no water, no sink, or shower in the space bathroom. No one is available to clean up either.

Astronauts do not take showers, he said. They do take sponge baths. In an experiment, it took eight hours for two Russian cosmonauts to take showers.

Rethke emphasized that astronauts do not leave waste in space and methods to convert liquid waste back into water have been developed. "If you want to be green, go into space. We even recycle urine," he said. Interestingly, diapers are used by astronauts for extended time periods outside of the space capsule.

Although his talk was directed to the children in the audience, adults paid rapt attention as Dr. Flush displayed freeze-dried food packets (including brownies and pudding) and various space suits and support equipment for astronauts' survival. He explained that carbonated beverages are not allowed because of their gases.

The first space suit took three years to build, weighed 300 pounds and was designed for zero gravity. Today space suits are equipped with in-suit drink packs, he noted. In fact juice boxes for astronauts predated the popular juice boxes children drink from today.

One of the children in attendance tried on a 24K gold-plated visor that protects astronauts from the sun's harmful rays. She could see perfectly, but audience members could not see her face.

Asked how astronauts sleep when they are weightless, Rethke explained that their pajamas include a Velcro patch that tethers to Velcro patches mounted on the inside walls of the space capsule, keeping them stationary.

The Kepler Mission: A Search for Habitable Planets was intriguing. This NASA project is named for Johannes Kepler (1571- 1630) who published Laws of Planetary Motion and is also known as the father of algebra.

The Kepler Mission was launched March 6, 2009 and has already begun to send back images on a daily basis. It is expected to continue to do this for four to six years. Scientists hope to determine just how many Earthlike planets are in our galactic neighborhood. Recent discoveries of planets in different solar systems have revealed that our solar system is not unique.